The Raitt tape: Reimagined for prime time

June 9, 2009

"I, too, am saddened that cabinet ministers and their aides can’t be bothered to speak in snappy Sorkinisms behind closed doors." – avr, commenting on my last blog thingy

Lisa Raitt and Jasmine MacDonnell walk briskly down a Parliament Hill corridor.

MacDonnell: Medical isotopes. It’s a confusing issue to a lot of people.

Raitt: But it’s sexy. Radioactive leaks. Cancer.

MacDonnell: Sexy?

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Raitt: Yeah, sexy.

MacDonnell: Meaning...

Raitt: Meaning hot, glamorous, appealing.

MacDonnell: So then... sexy.

Raitt: Yeah.

MacDonnell: OK.

[Pause.]

MacDonnell: Did you know that when an antelope senses the approach of a predator it warns others in the herd by repeatedly jumping up and down with all four legs leaving the ground simultaneously and remaining completely stretched out and perfectly straight?

Raitt: No.

MacDonnell: There’s a word for it.

Raitt: For what?

MacDonnell: For the jumping.

Raitt: The word’s not ’jumping?’

MacDonnell: No. It’s pronking.

Raitt: Oh.

MacDonnell: Yeah.

Raitt: So isotopes. Sexy.

MacDonnell: Yeah.

Raitt: OK.